


she's not him

by RosaLeoa



Series: pink, purple and blue [2]
Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Adopted Children, Adoption, Angst with a Happy Ending, Ben Solo Lives, Bisexual Ben Solo, Bisexual Finn (Star Wars), Bisexual Poe Dameron, Bisexual Rey (Star Wars), Bisexual Rose Tico, Cottagecore, Depression, Eventual Happy Ending, Everyone is Queer, F/F, F/M, Grief/Mourning, HopePunk, I only keep what sparks joy, Manipulative Sheev Palpatine, Marie Kondo approach to canon, Multi, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Past Finn/Rose Tico, Planet Naboo (Star Wars), Polyamory, Post-Canon, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Resurrection, Retcon, Rey Needs A Hug (Star Wars), Rey is Nobody (Star Wars), Rey is Not a Palpatine (Star Wars), Rose Tico Deserved Better, Rose Tico is the only one with common sense, Slice of Life, Therapy, World Between Worlds, anarchist utopia, complicated grief disorder, phantom limb syndrome
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-21
Updated: 2021-02-13
Packaged: 2021-03-09 18:08:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 7,261
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27660475
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RosaLeoa/pseuds/RosaLeoa
Summary: After Exegol, Rey is really struggling with her grief. Rose helps her function again and process her feelings. Rey wishes she could totally love her, but half of herself is dead....or so she thinks.
Relationships: Poe Dameron/Finn, Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren, Rey/Ben Solo/Rose Tico, Rey/Rose Tico
Series: pink, purple and blue [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1814467
Comments: 39
Kudos: 31
Collections: Queerly Beloved Reylo Fics





	1. My ghost, where'd you go? (I can't find you in the body sleeping next to me)

**Author's Note:**

> I wanna say thank you to @typewriter_in for beta-ing this and to everyone who enabled me [via Twitter](https://twitter.com/nerd_leoa)
> 
> I'm a broke South American PhD candidate and I set up [this Ko-Fi](https://ko-fi.com/nerdleoa) to anyone who wants to give a treat to my cats or buy me coffee in these difficult times.
> 
> This fic came to me almost ready while I was listening to ["She's Not Him" by Miley Cirus](https://open.spotify.com/track/6aP62822amG9iAvSIPffBr). This story will have a different ending than the song. I'll try to name the chapters with lyrics from queer singers. The first one is named with a line from [Halsey's "Ghost"](https://open.spotify.com/track/5dcYoYFAXh0f0qI05AoufB) .
> 
> If you stick around and bear the Angst, I swear on Leia's soul that this will have a Happy Ever After in Naboo.

Black holes aren't actually black. Rey learnt that when she was nine, via a holocron that kept her company in her downed AT-AT, back in the desert of Jakku. It's their power that makes them look like that, their insurmountable gravity whose pull not even light can escape. Rey has been feeling like that, a collapsed star, ever since Ben faded into nothing in her arms.

She thought she could go on with the memories of Leia and Ben, and Luke's occasional guidance through the Force. She thought she could be enough on her own, with her friends, with Finn, who called her "sister". It was more than what she once had. But a burnt down library isn't the same as one that never existed. When something is destroyed, its memory keeps haunting us. They ceased to exist and yet we remember them. Rey's nose could still smell Ben, her fingers remembered his hair. Her lips remembered his. Luke once told her he could still feel his cut-off arm before putting on the prosthetic. In the beginning, he would feel pain in the middle of the night, horrified that someone had put something over his existing hand. "Phantom limb syndrome" is what the doctors called it. Could it be applied to a Dyad missing their half?

She was good at pretending, though. Good at smiling during meals with the others and working hard to dismantle the remnants of the First Order. After Palpatine's - her… grandfather’s? - demise, Rey's place in the Resistance shifted. She was a war hero, yes, but she was also something of the past. A relic, nothing more than a vessel for all of the past Jedi.

" _Let the past die. Kill it, if you have to,_ " Ben had once said to her. As if he wasn't haunted by his own past too. As if he wouldn't come back to haunt her. He didn't. She kept meditating and trying to find their bond. And, again and again, Rey was forced to confront the truth: she was just reaching in the dark for a hand that wasn't there anymore. Through space and time, the fact remained: Ben was gone.

Rose made Rey shower just after Exegol's Battle to wash off her grit and blood. A week passed and Rey realized two things. The first was her stench. The second was that her hair was now just a nuisance. She didn't need the buns anymore, no one was coming to get her. No one was coming back.

Finn and Poe were really busy with their positions as co-generals, whatever that meant, and Rose seemed to be the only one who remembered Rey still needed to do basic stuff, like eating and bathing. When Rey told her she wanted a razor before going to shower again, Rose looked at her, eyes wide and mouth constricted in a thin line.

"Why do you need a razor to shower, my love?" Rose asked, gently touching Rey's arm.

"I won't do anything stupid, if that's what you're thinking," Rey muttered back, looking at the point where Rose's fingers almost touched Rey's covered scar.

"And what could I be thinking?"

Rey couldn't say the words out loud. She looked at Rose, opening and closing her mouth a few times before swallowing the big lump in her throat.

"Are you telling me that you don't intend to hurt yourself, Rey? Because I would rather you be truthful than gentle with me."

She took a step back because the lump grew bigger. Rose couldn't possibly understand. No one did. No one really knew her.

"I couldn't," was what she finally managed to say "I couldn't make it all be for nothing."

Rose's shoulders seemed to relax just a little bit. Rey was feeling angry now. How could anyone think that Rey would make Ben's sacrifice be for nothing? She hadn't asked to be brought back. She didn't want to keep going without him as much as he wouldn't bear this too. But Rose didn't know about it. Rey had to remember that she hadn't told anyone about what really happened back there at Exegol. Or about their bond. Only Luke and Leia knew about it and they were gone too.

"So… what do you need a razor for, Rey?"

Rey couldn't say it, but her hands went to her hair, grabbing it.

"I can't do it anymore," she confessed, "I hate having to brush it."

Rose went with her to the showers again. She took scissors and a razor and Rey sat between her legs on the floor, silently crying, while Rose hummed an unknown melody and took it all out. It didn't make Rey feel better, but, at least, made her feel _free_ of having to care. And made showering less of a burden.

Rose started to call her to go shower together and she would mindlessly talk to her while fixing engines and repairing ships side by side. She would give Rey portions of her food and her eyes would glint with happiness when Rey complimented her culinary skills, forcing herself to swallow.

But every ounce of happiness she managed to feel was sucked to the place inside her where everything went and vanished. When Rose wasn't around, Rey was drained of all emotion and willpower to do anything. When Rose wasn't around, Rey understood what attracted people to the Dark Side and what made them capable of slaying millions. Rey wanted to burn everything to the ground. Poe and Finn and their shared happiness first. The Resistance. The First Order. The people who dared to move on in the galaxy.

Inside a black hole, the pull of gravity makes time itself collapse. Light tries to escape it, since the star in its center keeps creating energy and matter, but it's trapped. And it gets bigger and bigger, devouring everything in their orbit. Scientists say that, one day, the whole universe will be devoured by them.

Rose, somehow, was capable of making the world feel lighter. She would take care of Rey's bald head every week, keeping it in a close shave, until the day she told Rey she adored the feeling of it when it grew a few inches. It felt like a carpet. It seemed like such a small thing that Rey could do to thank her and make her happy, that Rey asked her to not use the razor anymore, just some beard clippers that Poe would lend to them weekly.

At the end of each workday, they would lay down side by side outside the mechanics bay and Rose would tell Rey things about her childhood and the memories she still had of her parents and her planet. Rey understood that Rose, in a sense, faced what Rey was going through. She lost them. She lost Paige.

"... And I wasn't enough for Finn. I thought he loved me, he thought I loved him, but we were just passing ships," she confessed one day. Her voice was trembling and she was looking firmly at the stars, not facing Rey.

A soft breeze rustled the grass and made Rose's curls dance around her face. Dandelions flew in the air. It was a warm night.

"I was never enough to anyone," Rose whispered.

Rey reached out with her hand, looking for hers. She wasn't good at comforting others like Rose, but she could intertwine their fingers and gently squeeze Rose's tiny hand inside hers.

"You're everything I have," Rey didn't know if it was a good enough truth, but it was the truth. The current truth, at least.

Rose turned to her with a frown on her gentle face.

"That's a lie. Finn adores you, you're like his sister," Rose counter-argued.

"The person he used to love died in Exegol, Rose. You're the only one who sees me."

Rose made Finn and Poe not say a word about Rey's hair through all those months. Luckily, a couple of months after Exegol, Finn joined Jannah in the creation of their new Stormtrooper Deprograming initiative and left the Resistance base in search of the papers which would guide them back to their families. The unspoken motivation that Rey understood so well was his hope that the papers could guide him back to his own family.

Poe left soon after too, joining diplomatic efforts with Kaydel and other war heroes to create a Third Intergalactic Republic. Rose made a weird face when he told them those plans and, later, mumbled while buzzing Rey's hair that she didn't know if she believed in this. "Maybe we should let the planets try to govern themselves for once," was the sentence that got stuck in Rey's brain and made her refuse to join Poe when he sent a message to invite her.

During the past weeks, after a carefully worded comment on the depth of Rey's dark circles around her eyes, Rose started sharing her quarters with Rey. They assembled a second bed in a corner and Rey would sleep there. At least, she would fall asleep there.

She had night terrors almost every night, and she would wake up screaming and crying, not knowing where she was and calling for Ben. Rose never asked a thing, she would just curl around Rey in her tiny makeshift bed and caress her short spiky hair until Rey fell asleep again.

"Don't say that," Rose chastised her, "you're here, Rey."

It was Rey's turn to look at the sky with its four moons dancing in different phases around them. Rey knew she wouldn't be able to see any black holes, but she still tried. (like she still tried finding Ben through the Force)

"I meant literally. I died, back there at Exegol. Half of me is still dead."

The corners of Rey's eyes prickled with tears and there it was again, that lump in her throat. Rose squeezed her hand more strongly then.

"Can I ask how you're here with me? Why is your hand so warm against mine, if you're half-dead, Rey?"

Rey rolled on the grass, getting closer to Rose and laying her head on Rose's chest. Her constant heartbeat against Rey's ear gave Rey the strength to talk. At least a bit.

"I am something most people only heard of, unseen for over a millenia," like a wandering celestial body, dying and sucking everything onto them, "a Dyad in the Force. My other half was Leia's son, Ben Solo."

It was the first time Rey said his name out loud in months, to another human being. Rose hummed, signaling she was listening, and her chest rumbled under Rey's head. Tears started to roll out of her eyes and her voice trembled when she kept speaking:

"I'm also the daughter of a failed Palpatine clone". Saying this bit out loud sounded like a horrible holonovela plot or a distasteful joke, but it was what was left of her life in the end.

"Are you, now?" Rose asked.

"Yes."

"How do you know it?" Rose's voice was so gentle, but there was a sharpness to it, some edge Rey couldn't quite touch.

"Palpatine told Ben."

Rose hummed again.

"Leia told me about Palpatine," Rose said, after a few beats of silence, "from what she recollected of Obi-Wan Kenobi's words, he always had a penchant for lying."

It was Rey's turn to stay silent, her head revolving.

"No, I mean..."

"What proof did he give to Ben?"

Proof? Rey was stumped. The cave in Ach-To didn't show anyone besides her. She remembered her mother's face and some of her and she remembered her parents being junk-traders and drinking to bear the horrible conditions they lived in. She remembered Plutt taking her from them to pay for their debts and her mother screaming as her father pulled her away. Hands reached out to Rey as she was dragged to the ship that took them.

"...none."

"I don't know, Rey. Why should we consider this to be true? I mean, we can ask Poe to keep an eye on official papers to see if something about your birth and lineage show up, but do you really need it?"

They stayed in silence again. Rey was fidgeting with one of the ties in Rose's overalls, thinking. No names could fix the hole inside her. She remembered vaguely going to Tatooine and burying Leia and Luke's saber in the sand and telling a random old woman she was a Skywalker. As the months passed, she felt more and more like she did it all in some sort of a fugue. If she was nothing but a vessel, she could as well pretend she was Luke and this would make it all better.

Except it didn't. And except Rey wasn't a Skywalker and wasn't just a vessel. Rey was the place where not even light could find a way to shine.

It had been almost a year. Almost a year without Ben.

"I'm not a descendant of Palpatine," Rey stated, with an assurance in her voice that she didn't actually feel in her heart.

Rose hugged her and kissed the top of her head.

"You're Rey, just my Rey."

Rey hugged her back. Rose was solid, warm, and present. Rey wished she could feel belonging there.

"Leia talked very little about her son with me, Rey. How did you meet him?"

"In the battlefield in Takodana."

The wind was stronger now and dandelions were spiralling in the air around them, before disappearing in the night sky. Rey liked to pretend that they turned into stars.

"Was he there?"

"Yes. For a while, he was..." Rey gulped, scared of Rose's reaction, "he was known as Kylo Ren."

She could feel Rose's muscles tensing underneath her and Rose's grip on Rey got stronger, as if the small mechanic was getting ready to protect the last jedi against some unseen danger.

"He was a victim too, Rose, like Finn."

The steel grip on Rey's arms relaxed just the slightest bit.

"Snoke was a Palpatine clone. Snoke convinced Ben that everyone around him hated him and didn't want him. He convinced him that he was evil. He used to beat him, Rose, when Ben was younger, and Ben believed that he deserved it. And Luke failed him too, Luke almost tried to kill him when he was a teen."

"What?!" Rose sat on the grass, looking befuddled at Rey, who was still laying down, "That old charlatan did what?!"

"It's true, I confronted him and he admitted it."

Rose was furious.

"He tried to kill his own nephew?! Did Leia know this?! I hope she's kicking his ass in the afterworld!"

For the first time in months, Rey burst out in laughter. She was almost hysterical. She rolled on the grass, grabbing her own belly with both of her arms and feeling a different type of tears stain her face.

"Why are you laughing?" Rose asked, gently poking Rey's arm.

"I was afraid of your reaction to all of this, but I should have known… you're amazing, Rose."

"And why is that funny?"

"It's not that. It's just that I kicked Luke's ass when I learned about this," Rey answered, wiping her face with the heels of her hands.

Rose caged her on the grass, each of her arms on the sides of Rey's torso. Her adorable curls kept whipping her face with the wind. The only light shining over them was the moonlight from two of the four moons. Rose's face beamed with pride.

"Did you, now?"

"Yes," Rey whispered, suddenly breathless.

They met in the middle. Rey rose from the grass, supporting herself in her elbows, and Rose lowered herself towards her, embracing Rey with one hand and the other went to her hair. Her mouth was soft and she tasted like apple tea and coffee cake. Rose kissed with more experience and decisiveness than Ben did. It wasn't better. It wasn't worse. It wasn't Ben.

Thinking about him made Rey start trembling. Her body felt suddenly very cold and she had to stop kissing Rose and hold her in a vicious grip while huge sobs shook her whole body.

"Don't leave me!" Rey begged, inhaling Rose's smell, a mix of motor oil, industrial cleaner, chamomile soap and cinnamon shampoo. "Please, don't leave me, Rose!" Rose was solid in her arms, Rose held her back and whispered sweet nothings against the top of Rey's head until she finally calmed down.

After Rey's meltdown, Rose took her to see a doctor, who then prescribed some anxiety pills to help her sleep. Then she made Rey eat the whole dinnerplate she made for her in their bedroom. That night, Rey didn't even go to the folding bed.

Rose guided her, drowsy and tired, to the double bed and held her, humming sweet lullabies, until Rey passed out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some notes:  
> As someone who works with Healthcare, I refuse to accept that medical professionals, may they be humans or sentient aliens, could be substituted for medidroids like George Lucas told us. This is a hill I chose to die on.  
> Secondly, as a Latina, I also refuse to accept the absence of telenovelas in the Galaxy Far Far Away, so, by suggestion of my Beta, Rey watches holonovelas and they're just as convoluted and absurd as the real thing.


	2. Mon lit comme une banquise qui fond quand tu m'enlaces

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey woke up one day smelling him. He was on the bed with them. The universe was telling her that, somehow, he was back. Their bond was back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was named after a line from ["Ma mémoire sale"](https://open.spotify.com/track/6virKWv03O2DpcINCEAQV2) (My dirty memory) by Louis Garrel, from the musical "Les Chansons d'Amour" (Love Songs). It somewhat translates to "my bed is made of ice and it melts when you hold me".
> 
> (This is short because today was hard and I needed to write a little more about *my* Trio)

Rey woke up one day smelling him. He was on the bed with them. She could feel the heat radiating from his skin, she could feel the dip in the mattress from him taking up way too much space with his massive body. The sun peered through the curtains and, through her eyelashes, Rey could see him on her right side, laying on his back, his hair spread across the extra pillow Rose didn't use because she would always sleep curled around Rey.

His hair was shorter than Rose's and even blacker than hers. Rose's hair shone in auburn tones under the sun. Ben's was jet black, cool and blue-ish. And his chest was rising and falling slowly with his breath. The universe was telling her that, somehow, he was back. Their bond was back.

Rey stayed like that for a few moments, too happy and scared to move.

"Sunshine, what's wrong?" Rose's sleepy voice startled Rey.

She looked at the half-awake woman in her arms, not knowing how to explain that the Force had given her a second chance, and not knowing if Rose could see him too. Rey reached on the mattress to wake Ben and ask for his help, her heart thrumming like a fanfare inside her chest.

The bed was cold.

Her hand patted the mattress, a few times, confused, before Rey dared to look again. There was no one there.

Without thinking, Rey pushed Rose to the side and got up, desperate. She looked under the bed, inside the closet. He wasn't there. There was no one there. Rey ran her hands through her short hair, wondering where Ben could have gone. Where was he?

She opened the door of her shared bedroom with Rose and kept walking, opening every unlocked door she found, pounding on the locked ones and meeting confused stares from her comrades.

It was Chewie who managed to get her in the middle of the field, outside the base. It took him and two medidroids to immobilize and inject her with a tranquilizer, because Rey, barefoot and dressed only with Ben's sweater, kept calling for him and crying in broken sobs.

***

It wasn't like every single moment of Rey's days revolved around missing Ben. She worked a lot and Rose was teaching her how to swim, in a lake near the base. Rose would kiss her and Rey would reciprocate. She couldn't go further than that. Sometimes, she couldn't even kiss Rose for too long, always getting too worried that Rose would disappear too.

Rose was made of solid matter. And, yet, she was so gentle and kind that little by little Rey would tell things to her. About Ben, about their bond, about how she knew the Jedi Order would die with her because she couldn't teach anything to anyone. About how, once upon a time, she wanted to have a daughter and brush her hair like her mother used to do. Rey even told Rose about her parents things she never got to tell Ben.

And Rose would tell her about her childhood on Hays Minor and how gray her home planet was. How she barely had a childhood too, working all day on the mining system with Paige and their parents. She would tell her about the Moon Cakes her mother taught her how to make when they could save enough to buy the ingredients for the Moon Festival. Rose would tell her about how she never saw herself as a parent, because she couldn't trust that her children would have a safer life in a more just system in that Galaxy.

It was a conversation with C3-P0 that first gave them the idea of leaving the Resistance Base and going to Naboo. Apparently, Ben's maternal grandmother came from there and it was a green planet. Leia had nominated Rey as her heir too and now that Ben was dead, Rey was a very rich woman. And the new master of 3P0 and R2.

She even owned a house. The Naberrie Estate, apparently, still existed and was currently maintained by administrators. They could go there. Rey, Rose, and the droids. Rey could learn how to grow plants and Rose could have her own lab to create whatever her beautiful and crafty mind invented.

Rey and Rose started dedicating a huge chunk of their time repairing an old Resistance ship that could take them across the Galaxy. Chewie was now the sole owner of the Falcon and he would appear from time to time to visit and tell them news about his family. He was a comforting presence to Rey and Rose liked him a lot too. They invited him to come visit them in Naboo and he promised that he would.

***

It had been almost two years after Exegol when Rey and Rose first arrived at Naboo. It was even more beautiful than Takodana, with its lush forests integrated with beautiful cities. The 3rd Republic hadn't got to them yet and the people in Naboo were organizing in their neighborhoods and cities, using the holonet to trade information and make bigger decisions amongst them.

They were once a monarchy, with Ben's grandmother as the last queen in Naboo. Now, forgotten by the bigger players in the galactic political game, the people took care of each other.

Rey and Rose found out that the huge Naberrie mansion was being repaired by a group of locals, with the intention to transform it into a school for the local children. At first, they got very defensive when Rey explained to them that she was the Naberrie heir, but then Rey said she had no objections to their plan and Rose offered to help and, soon, they were part of the community.

They were offered a smaller farm house near the city that had recently been vacant. It was technically inside the Naberrie Estate and Rose could walk by foot to the mansion to help with the renovations. Initially, Rey offered to go with her, but soon she found out that being around too many people was too much for her, and she decided to stay at home and learn what she could about tending to their plants. 3P0 stayed with her while R2 went with Rose to the future school.

When the school was ready, the locals decided to throw an inauguration party and Rey had to go, since Rose and she were honored guests. They baked mooncakes, the way Rose's mom had taught her, and offered them in the small feast. It was a very simple party, since the riches of Naboo were a thing of the past, but everyone was taken care of, fed, and happy. The music was joyful and the children ran around, laughing and playing, thrilled with their school. Rose was formally invited to be a robotics teacher. She burst out in tears of happiness when she accepted it, hiding her face on Rey's chest, while Rey forced herself to smile and reassured the local council that this was a good thing.

That night, Rey kissed Rose hard for the first time. They took out their clothes in their bedroom and Rey let Rose kiss her whole body, even the most intimate folds of her being. It was weird, it was good, Rey wondered why she took so long to try it. Her whole body was tingling with pleasure and, for the first time in two and a half years, she didn't feel consumed with sorrow.

When pleasure burst out inside of her, like a supernova exploding without a sound in space, Ben embraced her on the bed and gave her a bruising kiss on her lips. Rey's right hand let go of Rose's hair and went to where his scar used to be, tracing it. He held her by her nape and smiled when they broke the kiss. Like he did on Exegol, there were dimples on his cheeks.

"I love your new hair," he said, and Rey kissed him again, before he disappeared once more, "I'm waiting for you, sweetheart."

He pushed Rey away from him, vanishing into the shadows of her peripheral vision, and Rose sat on her knees on the bed, pulling Rey in to kiss her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One Art  
> (Elizabeth Bishop)
> 
> The art of losing isn’t hard to master;  
> so many things seem filled with the intent  
> to be lost that their loss is no disaster.
> 
> Lose something every day. Accept the fluster  
> of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.  
> The art of losing isn’t hard to master.
> 
> Then practice losing farther, losing faster:  
> places, and names, and where it was you meant  
> to travel. None of these will bring disaster.
> 
> I lost my mother’s watch. And look! my last, or  
> next-to-last, of three loved houses went.  
> The art of losing isn’t hard to master.
> 
> I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,  
> some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.  
> I miss them, but it wasn’t a disaster.
> 
> —Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture  
> I love) I shan’t have lied. It’s evident  
> the art of losing’s not too hard to master  
> though it may look like (Write it!) like disaster.


	3. Next to you, the sky is so blue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It was very different than before. Their bond, that is. Rey still couldn't really feel him the same way, but he was with her, haunting her. He would only appear when Rey was in a good mood and vanish completely when she felt like a black hole again, sucking everything around her.

Rey got used to seeing him on occasion. Usually when she and Rose were on the bed, Ben would show up and kiss her, hold her, and make her feel good too. He also appeared once when Rose was giving her swimming lessons.

Rey had her head under the water and she was splashing clumsily with her limbs, trying to remember all the things she had to do to not drown in the lake, when he appeared and supported her under her belly along with Rose and his thoughts went straight to her head.

He was remembering when Han helped him in the same way, when he was a little boy.

It was very different than before. Their bond, that is. Rey still couldn't really feel him the same way, but he was with her, haunting her. He would only appear when Rey was in a good mood and vanish completely when she felt like a black hole again, sucking everything around her.

He wouldn't appear when she fought with Rose, who sometimes got frustrated with Rey's slow progress, and the fact that she was a dead weight in the house chores more often than not. Rose was kind and gentle, and patient, but she was also a human being and there were days in which she just would get exasperated with seeing Rey consume herself in front of her eyes.

"Newsflash: you're all I have too!" Rose screamed at her face one day, slamming a cabinet door and slicing their onions in anger. "You're not the only one who suffered a loss, Rey. You're not the only one who was traumatized by this war!" She started crying and kept cutting the vegetables with purpose.

It had been four days since Rey had left the bed for the last time and Rose was tired of doing everything and cleaning after her. Rey had practically been dragged out of the bed by Rose, who told her it was Rey's turn to do maintenance on 3P0 and R2 or else.

"I'm sorry for being a burden, Rose," Rey muttered, trying not to cry too. She sighed heavily and added, "perhaps I could… I could leave. I could go to Ach-To like Luke did."

"Are you daft?!" Rose threw the knife inside the kitchen sink, not bothering controlling her movements. "Have you been listening to what I'm saying at all, Rey?!"

"Yes. You're tired of me and I know I'm not good enough..."

"Fuck you." Rose's voice was suddenly very calm. "You know what? Fuck you, Rey."

Rey stopped oiling R2 and looked at Rose, who was still crying. She stared at Rey with an indignant fire in her eyes.

" _Not good enough,"_ she spat, angry, at Rey. "Do you think I hate myself?"

"What?"

"It's a very simple question, Rey. Do you think I hate myself?"

"Obviously not, Rosie. What are you…?"

"If I don't hate myself, then why the hell did I uproot my life to come here to Naboo _with you_? Why am I caring for you and living with you for the past two years?"

Rey started shaking. She had no idea what the answer to this was. She would often wonder what she did to deserve Rose.

"I don't… I… Why are you here with me, Rose?"

"I love you, you idiot. I've told you a few times already. I am in love with you and I think you're the greatest person I've ever met. Also, you were the first person to really see me, Rey. You were the one who didn't assume I was _just a mechanic_."

"You're the best engineer I've met, Rose," Rey blurted out. She wasn't trying to be flattering, it was just something that was so obvious to her that she got shocked when she realized that other people in the Resistance didn't seem to think that also.

Rose inhaled deeply and gave a sad smile.

"I just can't be the one that always gives and always cares, Rey. I want to have the right to be selfish too."

Rey wiped her forehead, thinking of how she could motivate herself better to care for Rose.

"The way you're handling our vegetable garden… It's amazing, Rey. I just wish you could have more consistency. Can you have more consistency? Do we need more professional help?"

"Professional help?"

"Yes, like the doctor on the Resistance base. It helped, didn't it? We could, I don't know, we could seek a doctor here in Naboo. Someone to help you deal with all that you're living through. Because I need help, Rey. I can't go on like that, I can't."

That was when Rey also realized that she had never said it back. She had never said it out loud. Not to Rose. Not to Ben. Not to anyone.

"I love you."

Rose raised her head quickly, looking shocked.

"That's not it, Rey. I don't need you to be gentle, I need you to be..."

"Truthful. Yes, I know. I am. Truthful. I love you, Rose. I want to be better for you. I… I'll shower after finishing with R2 and we can eat lunch. And then… and then we can look for a doctor, for me. Is that ok?"

Rose's smile was so bright it shattered something inside Rey. Rose made the gravity pull seem lighter. She walked towards Rey, her hands smelling of onions and herbs for their lunch when she held Rey's face between them.

"Can you say it again?"

"I love you, Rose."

Later, it was Rey who would try to scrub out the oil stains she left on Rose's teaching clothes, still feeling on her lips the taste of Rose's body and Rose's food. When she was putting the clean laundry in the clothesline they had in their backyard, a shadow appeared between the sheets drying in the wind.

Rey could feel it. Energy and matter, light.

She pushed some sheets to the side and looked up and up until meeting his face under the sun. He was smiling.

"You need to come back to me, Ben," she said, as if he had just left to buy more chicken food.

"And why is that?" He asked, with a boyish smile on his face.

"I need to tell you in person that I love you."

She could almost feel his fingers when he touched her cheek. Rey wanted to close her eyes to his touch, but she refused, knowing he would disappear soon.

"I know."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Miley again. This time with ["Malibu"](https://open.spotify.com/track/1UZOjK1BwmwWU14Erba9CZ)  
> Next chapters, there will probably be mentions of Rey doing therapy because, even in space, this is how you heal from severe mental illness, kids. Love only gets us so far.  
> Also, warning (I'll add this in the tags too), Rose, Rey, and Ben's HEA will involve kids. At least one adopted child, I'm debating on making Rey pregnant in the end or not. If this triggers you, please, choose wisely on to wether keep reading the story or not


	4. Morrer tanto

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When Rey was walking back home, she passed a bunch of wild flowers. She decided to pick them. Not for Rose, but for her. To put on a vase in their living room. She would give herself flowers, wouldn't she? If she was someone who liked themselves.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "and cold sweat holds me and shaking  
> grips me all, greener than grass  
> I am and dead—or almost  
> I seem to me" -Sappho

"So, Rose can't stop talking about her students. There's this girl especially, Jamillia, who is her favorite, and Rose even lets her braid her hair. Sometimes she gets home with it in a tangled mess of badly-done plaits."

The lake gleamed in the sun, down the hill where Rey and doctor Dalné sat and chatted. The therapy sessions consisted of long walks in the area in which Rey mostly talked on her own. Once in a while, doctor Dalné would offer her point of view about something. There were times in which Rey would spend their whole hour repairing something and not speaking, while the doctor handed her tools and sat beside her in silence.

It was nothing like she had imagined. Surprisingly, it appeared to be working. Towards what, Rey had no idea, but she showered most days now. Rey realized that she still feared wasting resources on herself and part of the reasons why she wouldn't eat and bathe when she was feeling bad was to spare the food and the water for Rose, who she thought deserved them more.

"She loves them. Sometimes I think that she likes them more than she likes me," Rey confessed, looking at the lake and not turning to the doctor. There were some truths she needed to say without looking into her mismatched blue and brown eyes. "It's silly, I know."

"I don't," the doctor interrupted her. "Why is it silly to wonder about the feelings of your partner?"

"I can't know Rose's feelings. Not like Ben and I  _ know _ each other's. Rose is another person, her own person, with her own feelings, like everyone else. So it's pointless to keep obsessing about them."

They stayed in silence for a while. Rey kept grabbing fistfulls of grass and ripping it off the ground. She still had so much anger inside her. She had no idea when that anger would go away. The doctor made no promises in that sense.

"I mean, I don't know. No one ever taught me anything about other people and I don't think that holonovelas are the best reference… Is it silly to keep thinking that Rose doesn't really like me?"

"Why would she not like you?"

Rey sighed. They had been over this again and again. But it still nagged at the back of her mind.

"The children are adorable. And they aren't huge failures, mooching over Rose's food and sleeping all day like a lothcat, completely adrift in life. I know that Rose loves me, but does she like me?"

The wind made small waves on the grass and the surface of the lake. Rey ran a hand over her spiky hair, frustrated.

"How could she like me, doctor?" She groaned, burying her head between her knees.

After another beat of silence, the doctor's voice startled Rey:

"Because you don't, that is?"

She raised her head, looking right into the doctor's eyes. Her heartbeat thrummed madly against her throat.

"What can you do so you can like yourself a little more, Rey?" She raised one hand and stopped Rey from answering. "Don't say anything to me now. Our time is up and I will see you in three days, ok? During these days, I want you to try an exercise for me."

"Sure."

"I want you to act as if you liked yourself. Not to others, but to you. What would you do differently, if you liked yourself?"

  
  


***

When Rey was walking back home, she passed a bunch of wild flowers. She decided to pick them. Not for Rose, but for her. To put on a vase in their living room. She would give herself flowers, wouldn't she? If she was someone who liked themselves.

Rose was still at the school, so Rey decided to spend her day taking care of her plants. She liked caring for them, she liked how green and colorful they were. So, she deserved to do it, instead of spending her day looking at the holonet and resenting Finn and Poe for being so effortlessly happy. She deserved to pull at the weeds around her strawberries instead of wondering if Rose would go back home in the end of the day or if that would be the day she would realize she had made a horrible mistake in choosing to be with Rey.

When she was finished, Rey decided she would try to make dinner. Rose always cooked for them, but Rey could do something for them too. That's what normal people do. People who like themselves.

The food was in the oven and Rey decided it was time to take a shower. No, a bath. People who like themselves take baths. She showered first to take the grit out and then she allowed herself to just soak for a while, enjoying the smell of the soap and the warmth of the water.

She woke up to the sounds of someone slamming things in the kitchen. Rose was home and she was shouting instructions to Threepio. There was a horrible smell of burnt food in the air. Oh no.

How long was she out?

Rey got out of the tub, enveloped herself in a towel, and ran to the kitchen. When she arrived, she saw that her lasagna had been burnt to a crisp and the tray appeared to be ruined too. Rose was opening all the windows and fanning the air with a towel, coughing with the smoke.

"Oh no. I'm so sorry… I… I wanted to make something nice for you. For us," Rey muttered.

Rose turned at her, frowning.

"Yes, it was really nice to come home after a long day of work and find it like this."

Rey felt her heart drop to her stomach. What was she thinking? She didn't do anything right.

"I… I'm sorry, Rose. You always cook and I wanted to..."

"It appears that I'll have to cook today as well, Rey." Rose turned her back at Rey again and closed the faucet she had let running over the burnt lasagna.

"Are you angry?" Rey didn't want to cry, but she really needed to cry.

"I'm tired, Rey."

"Of me?"

Rose took a deep breath and her shoulders dropped.

"Not everything is about you, Rey. I'm tired and I really didn't need to deal with this today." She looked at Rey's feet over her shoulder. "You're dripping all over the floor. Go get ready and I'll make dinner in the meanwhile."

Rey closed the bathroom door behind herself and slid to the floor, crying. Would that be the day Rose would realize she didn't need to deal with her?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Healing is a path.  
> Today's chapter is named after Clarice Falcão's song ["Morrer Tanto"](https://open.spotify.com/track/6XretS6f5GtvWZrXOObZpF) (To die so much) and the lyrics talk about someone who feel things too deeply and feels like they die every time they're suffering and how much they envy other people, who can keep going on without this weight on their chest. In other words: Rey.


	5. wait for me (I'm coming)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In her chest, she could feel a nervous and shifty energy, like a swarm of butterflies fighting to leave.  
> Her whole body hummed.  
> She could feel it.  
> She could feel him.  
> Somehow, Ben wasn’t dead anymore.

Jamillia moved in with Rey and Rose. Her grandmother was too old and tired to care for the 6 year-old girl alone and Rose volunteered to take her in. Her skin was darker than Rose’s, but their eyes were shaped the same. Jamillia had lost a tooth and her long nose scrunched when she laughed, like Rey’s.

In two weeks, she asked if they were her mothers. She had no memory of having one. Her parents had been killed by the First Order.

“Sure, peanut,” Rey was the first to answer. “I can be mamacita and Rose is…”

“Mẹ,” was Rose’s answer, without raising her head from the shirt she was mending for Jamillia. “I’m mẹ.”

The little girl laughed, delighted.

“I have two moms now! Every kid in school will be jealous of me!” She got up from the floor, dragging her doll, and ran to C3P0. “Threepio, Threepio, did you hear? I have _two_ moms!”

***

Rey was cold, very cold, and wet. She was in the dark, under the water.

She knew that place. It had been a while.

Her breath turned into smoke when she exhaled. She walked to the mirror, knowing she would see herself reflected there, in the shadows lurking around her vision.

The blurry image got clearer and clearer as her hand got closer to the surface.

Her fingers crossed it, as if the mirror was but another layer of water. She touched familiar fingers.

Warm.

Solid.

Alive.

Rey raised her head and her eyes met the ones she could never forget.

Brown, almost yellow. Warm.

“Ben,” she whispered.

He smiled.

“Ben!” She tried to grab his hand, but it eluded her like a fish in a pond. “Ben!”

***

She sat on the bed, her breathing was fast and shallow. Ben.

In her chest, she could feel a nervous and shifty energy, like a swarm of butterflies fighting to leave.

Her whole body hummed.

She could feel it.

She could feel _him._

Somehow, Ben wasn’t dead anymore.

On her left, Rose stirred in her sleep. Her hand reached to envelop Rey's wrist.

“What’s wrong?” She mumbled, half-awake.

Rose’s fingers were so warm that Rey thought they would brand her.

“Nothing. Nothing is wrong.” She laughed and rolled on the bed to grab Rose’s face with both hands and kiss her passionately. “He’s waiting for us,” she whispered in the middle of the kiss.

“He…?” Rose asked, still dazed.

“Ben. He’s waiting for us to go to Ach-To and bring him back from the World Between Worlds.”

This made Rose really wake up, rubbing her eyes and turning the bedside lamp on.

“What are you talking about, Rey?”

Rey couldn’t stop laughing. There were butterflies inside her.

“He can live, Rose. I know it. I’ve read about it in old Jedi texts.”

Rey got up and got her backpack from their closet, starting to pack for the trip.

“Rey, this… Wait a minute, what are you doing?”

Why wasn’t Rose happy too?

“I’ve told you, Rose!” Rey said, impatient. “He’s my dyad. My soulmate. If there’s a slight possibility to bring him back, I have to do it.”

Rose let out a sob and this made Rey stop and turn to her.

“Are you leaving me?” There were tears streaking through her cheeks. “We have a daughter now, Rey. Are you leaving us?”

Rey let everything drop to the ground and ran back to the bed, trying to clean the tears from Rose’s cheeks.

“No. No. What are you talking about? You need to come with me. I can’t do this without you, Rose.”

“You want _me_ to help _you_ bring your _soulmate_ back from the dead?” She asked, angry. “And what’s to be made of me after you two are happily reunited?”

Rey blinked a lot, confused.

“What…? I… I always told you I loved him too.”

“Yes, but he’s _dead_ , Rey. Things are going to be pretty different if he comes back.”

“Yes. They will be _better_. I will be better. You too. You will love him too.”

Rose got up from the bed.

“You have no idea what I will or won’t do!” She hissed. “If he’s your _soulmate_ , Rey, what am I? What the last three years of our lives are?”

“Everything,” Rey answered, simple. “You… You’re not my soulmate. I wasn’t made to love you like Ben and I are. You are…”

Rose was crying a lot and Rey felt the tears gathering in her eyes too.

“I choose to love you, Rose. I choose every day to love and honor and be with you because I think you’re the most amazing person I’ve ever met. And, and… We aren’t soulmates, but… We are kindred spirits, aren’t we?”

Rose laughed in the middle of her tears and ran her hands through her face.

“So, what you’re proposing is that we call Finn and Poe and ask them to babysit Jami while we cross the galaxy to bring our soon-to-be husband back from the dead?”

Rey was smiling again.

“If you love me, you will love him too, Rose. We are two halves of the same soul. And I know that he loves you already.”

Rose sat on the edge of the bed and kissed Rey tenderly on her lips.

“Kriff, Rey, when have I ever been able to say no to you?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been a while since the last update, but we are approaching our HEA. I hope you liked this chapter :)


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